


Moments of Impact

by aconfederacyofscript



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: F/F, alternative universe
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-16
Updated: 2015-03-16
Packaged: 2018-03-18 05:53:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,495
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3558569
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aconfederacyofscript/pseuds/aconfederacyofscript
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Vow AU (based loosely on the film). Skye and Jemma have been married for years when they get into a car accident and Jemma loses her memory. Skye does everything in her power to make her remember and to make her fall in love with her again, but doesn't succeed. What happens when to lost souls are forced to move on and hobble into new relationships, while in their hearts it's pure?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Moments of Impact

**Author's Note:**

> For the record, all rights reserved to the original content creaters of The Vow. I took the liberty of copying events/text from the original movie. I don’t own any of that.
> 
> Thanks for reading!

Skye had a theory; a theory about moments of impact.The moment of impact proves potential for change. It has ripples effects far beyond what we can predict, sending some particles crashing together, making them closer than before. While sending others spinning off into great ventures, landing them where you’ve never thought you’ve found them. That’s the thing about moments like these. You can’t, no matter how hard you try, control how it’s going to affect you. You just have to let the colliding part goes where they may. And wait… Wait for the next collision.

Skye is excited like a five year old when they walk out of the cinema. The streets are laced in what looks like two and a half inches of snow. It sparkles in the dim light of the lamp posts and has barely been touched, aside from a few footsteps and dog paws here and there.

“There wasn’t even an inch when we went in,” Jemma remarks and laughs when Skye sticks out her tongue to catch a flake. “Don’t get brain freeze.”

“It’s beautiful though,” Skye says, bouncing back to Jemma through the snow, linking their arms together, “like you.”

Jemma just rolls her eyes and presses a kiss to Skye’s cheek. Her cheeks are red, but she doesn’t know exactly if it’s from the cold, or because she’s blushing.

“I’m cold,” Jemma says when a shiver runs down her back and Skye rubs her hand over Jemma’s arm.

“Let’s go home. I can make hot cocoa and we can settle down on the couch. Watch Netflix, read a book? How does that sound?”

“Perfect, really.” Jemma smiles warmly and Skye leads them to their car, that looks more like an iced cake at the moment.

“Okay, you get in, put on the heat and I’ll clean the window,” Skye says, putting the keys into her hand and shooing her to the passenger’s side. She uses the sleeve of her coat to wipe most of the snow from the front window. Her laugh is cushioned when Jemma waves at her when the snow disappears between them. Skye winks. Jemma always made her feel warm and comfortable, no matter how cold it was outside. She always started a fire in her chest, turning her insides to mush. No matter what time of day, no matter what month of the year.

“It’s fine! Come inside! You’re fine!” Jemma shouts and taps the window. The engine is already running, but she can still see Jemma shake in the seat.

Once she’s next to Jemma, she holds out her hands to Skye. “I can’t feel my fingers, help,” she whispers and sighs when Skye kisses each fingertip and blows on them, carefully rubbing them between her palms.

“Better?”

“Yes.”

Skye nods and pulls Jemma in for a soft kiss. “I love you so much.”

It has Jemma’s head spinning. No matter how many times Skye tells her that she loves her, it always makes her head spin. It’s always a little hard to believe, even though they have been married for three years. Three perfect years. 

* * *

_Skye weighs the ring in her hand, in front of her the two mugs that she uses every morning. Jemma always uses different ones, but Skye doesn’t. She wants to drink from her Avenger mugs when she makes coffee and tea in the morning. She swallows hard. It’s a pretty ring. You know when it’s the right one, you just do. She takes a deep breath and drops the ring into the Hulk mug, picking them both up and walking over to the bedroom where Jemma is sitting up against the headboard, reading the newspaper._

_She looks beautiful, Skye thinks, like always. It was one of the reasons why she wants to marry her. Jemma never seized to amaze her. Her hair is an absolute mess, the remnants of last night’s eyeliner are still under her eyes, her forehead rippled in a frown, glasses on her nose, but Skye’s heart still stutters as much as it did the first time she laid eyes on her._

_“Morning, beautiful person.”_

_Jemma looks up, the worried frown immediately making place for a wide smile. “Good morning, Skye.”_

_“Here, drink up. Don’t burn your mouth, though.”_

_“Thank you.”_

_Skye settles back down on her side of the bed, placing her mug on the nightstand. She bites the inside of her cheek, occasionally glancing over to Jemma, who drinks her tea scalding hot anyway._

_It takes forever for Jemma to finish. Normally it feels as if Jemma drank up in two minutes, but this time the arms of the clock just drag on and on._

_“Skye, are you feeling alright?” Jemma asks one moment, but all Skye can do is nod and focus back on the iPad laying in her lap. She tries to read something while eating toast, but it’s not working. She’s not hungry. Nerves have clenched up her throat, send her heart racing._

_She doesn’t know why she’s so nervous. It’s not like she thinks Jemma is going to say no, the opposite actually. She thinks Jemma will be delighted, over the moon. She is head over heels for Skye after all. They have discussed this before. Jemma wants to get married, Skye knows that, and she can’t think of a single reason why she wouldn’t want to marry her. Or why she wouldn’t want to marry Jemma._

_“Oh…” Jemma says out of the blue and looks at her hand. The ring is laying perfectly still in the palm and Jemma is staring at it with the biggest eyes she’s ever seen._

_“Oh, Skye…” Tears are filling up her eyes and a smile spreads across her cheeks, “we said we would wait. I never expected you to… oh my god, are you serious?”_

_Skye grins and wipes a tear off Jemma’s cheek. “Of course I am. I love you so much. I have never ever in my life loved anyone like I love you and I don’t want to love anyone like I love you. You look at me and I feel like I’m on top of the world. You make me so very happy and I know we said we would wait, but why would we wait until we’re even more settled in. We live together, we both have a job, we have great friends and most of all I just really fucking love you Jemma Simmons. So please, will you marry me?”_

_“Yes, of course, Skye. I will marry you. I’d love to. I can’t believe this is happening,” Jemma squeaks, putting a hand to her mouth “God, I love you so much.”_

_Skye laughs, kissing Jemma so hard her lips almost hurt. A moment of impact._

* * *

Skye is singing along to the radio, dancing in her seat, her fingers entwined with Jemma’s in her lap.

“You know you’re a terrible singer right, Skye,” Jemma says and laughs when her wife glares at her.

“You’re supposed to support me.” Skye grins, focussing back on the road again, “but you’re right. I’m a terrible singer.”

“It’s a good thing you’re better at a lot of other things,” Jemma says. There’s a lot lingering in her voice that has Skye swallowing hard. She stops in front of a red traffic lights and turns her body.

“Like what?” Skye teases and Jemma unbuckles her seatbelt, leaning over to brush her lips along her jaw to her ear.

“Like this,” she whispers, planting an open mouthed kiss to the hollow behind her jaw and Skye’s breath hitches.

“Or this.” Her fingers find their way under Skye’s sweater, grazing the skin of her abdomen, drawing her nails to her lower back.

“Jem,” Skye hisses when Jemma bites down gently on the delicate flesh above her clavicle and sucks.

The world stops spinning for a moment when the squeak of breaks hits their ears. Their eyes lock as the realisation dawns on them. A car horn blasts, muffled by the thick coat of snow, slipping tires. A moment of impact. Skye’s forehead hits the wheel, bouncing back forcefully while Jemma breaks loose from her seat and flies straight through the windshield, glass raining down around them.

* * *

_“I vow to help you love life, to always hold you with tenderness and to have the patience that love demands, to speak when words are needed and to share the silence when they are not, to agree to disagree on red velvet cake, and to live within the warmth of your heart and always call it home.”_

_“I vow to fiercely love you in all your forms, now and forever. I promise to never forget that this is a once in a lifetime love. And to always know in the deepest part of my soul that no matter what challenges might carry us apart, we will always find our way back to each other,” Skye says, folding the menu she’s holding in half._

_It’s the menu from the Italian restaurant they went to every Tuesday. Tuesday was date night. Saturday was too ordinary. People always had date nights on Saturday. Skye scribbled her vows on the back of it the night before when she drank one sip too much tequila._

_Jemma is holding the exact same menu, but she’s written her vows on the front. She insisted they got married in a library, because that’s the place that holds all the greatest love stories. The tragic ones, but mostly the ones that made it. And she wanted their story to be amongst those. Skye agreed happily, she got the red velvet wedding cake after all._

_“I hereby pronounce you married. You may kiss the bride!”_

_Skye’s cheeks hurt from smiling too much. Jemma looks wonderful, so beautiful she cried when Jemma walked down the aisle. Jemma’s cousin Maria said she looked like a meringue, but Skye didn’t care. After Jemma said yes, she never worried again. She knew Jemma would be there, she knew Jemma would say I do, she knew Jemma would be with her for the rest of her life._

_Jemma wraps her arms around Skye’s neck when they kiss and Skye lifts her into it, crashing their bodies together._

_“I love you,” she whispers against her lips and she smiles so wide that their teeth clash. It’s perfect. Maybe the best kiss they’ve had together, Jemma decides soon after. Everything just locks into place perfectly. The way the rings slid around their fingers, the way the vows sounded in their voices, the way the cake tastes on her tongue, the way Jemma tastes on their first night together. It’s perfect._

* * *

Even though the beeping of the monitors is rhythmic, Skye can’t calm down her own heart. Her head hurts from the crash, her wrist in a sling to her chest, Jemma’s body in the bed next to her.

Her eyes crack open then all of a sudden, and Skye rises to her feet. Her hands are still enveloping Jemma’s and she swallows hard, unable to shake the memory of the crash from her thoughts.

“Hey, how are you feeling?” Skye asks, bust mostly Jemma just squints to clear her vision.

“What happened? Where am I?”

“You were in a car accident,” a different voice speaks up and they both turn their heads to the sound. It’s Jemma’s doctor, who already realised that Jemma had woken up from her medically induced coma. They kept her like that for a week to reduce the swelling in her brain. “You were lucky it was cold outside.” Her smile is warm, but Jemma looks confused, still.

“Why are you holding my hand? You’re my doctor, right? You’re not… you’re not supposed to do that?” Jemma splutters, looking down at Skye’s hands. Skye quickly releases in a reflex.

“I’m… I… We…” Skye sits down. Her head spins, but not in a good way. Her pounding headache comes back rushing, flooding her head. “I am your wife, Jemma. We married each other in 2012.”

There’s a silence then in which Jemma just looks at her as if she’s just flown through a windshield again.

“We’re married?”

“Yeah…”

“What year is it now?”

“Twenty fifteen…” Skye answers and runs her hand through her hair. “You don’t remember me, do you?”

Jemma swallows hard and shakes her head. “I’m sorry,” she whispers. “I’m so sorry.”

Skye just nods, slumming down in her chair. “It’s okay. We’ll figure it out.”

* * *

 _“Just_ try _it, Skye. Play this game with me. Chocolate roulette.”_

_“This is like Harry Potter. You know I haven’t forgotten that time you made me try Bertie Bott’s Every Flavour Beans. So this time with chocolate? I don’t know if I trust you Jemma Simmons,” Skye says. She laughs, picking a sphere with cocoa dust on top, putting it in her mouth at once._

_“Come on, bite down on it.”_

_“I don’t dare to,” Skye manages to produce around the chocolate and frowns when she bites down eventually. Liquor seeps from the cracks and she chews quickly. She did really like chocolate, and she did really like booze, but not the combination of the two._

_“Oh my god that’s disgusting.” She makes a face and Jemma laughs, throwing her head back,_

_“Okay, Jemma, your turn.”_

_“You do realise I always win this game we play, right? I always have the tasty chocolate mousse ones, or the praline ones, or the ones with caramel in the middle.”_

_“I just suck at this game,” Skye grins and reaches over the table to press a kiss to her lips._

_“You taste terrible.” Jemma scrunches her nose before popping another chocolate into her mouth, chewing immediately. “See. I got caramel. You suck indeed.”_

_“Say caramel again.”_

* * *

It’s been two weeks since Jemma decided that she needed to fall back into her old rhythm in order to maybe regain her memory. It’s been two weeks since they have been living together like complete strangers. It is as if the last five years of their lives never happened at all.

Skye remembers everything about Jemma. Every moment of impact that brought them back together, every moment of impact that send them flying away from each other. The ripple effect.

She found Jemma sitting on their living room table countless of times, pinpointing where exactly her memory ends. It’s somewhere in twenty ten. Skye swallows hard. Everything was different then. They didn’t know each other. Skye had only just started working for Shield, while Jemma was still working for the Academy. They hadn’t settled down, neither apart or together. Skye probably didn’t even realise she would fall in love with a woman eventually. But she did. And she’s still so much in love with the woman who hardly recognizes her when they sit at their breakfast table.

Jemma doesn’t respond to her touches the way she did. She startles easily when Skye does something that once was so familiar to the both of them, but now is a hollow shell of what once was them. It hurts like hell, but Skye can’t help but try to make Jemma fall in love with her again.

She has to try. They vowed to try. Skye wants to stick by their vows, but she realises that Jemma cannot remember their vows. She can’t remember writing them down, she can’t remember the chocolate roulette, she can’t remember their first date, their first kiss, their first time, their first everything. Not the wedding. Nothing.

Jemma doesn’t even look at her the same anymore. Jemma used to look at her as if she put the stars in the sky, as if she was the most precious thing to ever grace the earth. And Skye knew she wasn’t the most precious thing to ever grace the earth and they both were very well aware of the fact that someone cannot put the stars in the sky. But Jemma looked at her like that nonetheless, warmth and love spilling from her eyes, always hinting in the smile, always there in her touch.

They never fought, or argued. Now they did. And they went to bed angry, something they decided wasn’t something they wanted to do. They didn’t want to be  _that couple_. It was either make up sex, or talk it out – preferably both, but they didn’t go to bed angry. Now they didn’t even sleep together.

“Skye?”

“Yes, honey? I mean… I’m sorry…” Skye rubs her face and sighs deeply before forcing a smile on her face and looking up. “Yeah?”

“Today I figured out I have a usual at that bakery on the corner… what is it called again?”

Skye smiles. They would go there for breakfast all the time.

“The Playground.”

“Oh yes. You know, I also figured I have a usual.”

“Was it good?”

“It was. It reminds me of England…” Jemma focuses back on the newspaper then and Skye swirls her orange juice around her glass. “I bumped into Adam.”

“Adam?”

“Yes. It was so lovely to see him. It was almost as if I was back in college, you know? I felt so at home with him, it’s… it feels so familiar, you know. We went for lunch, and I told him what happened. He was awfully sorry, but it was so great to be around him again.” Jemma smiles, and it’s the first genuine smile she’s seen on her for days.

“I understand…” Skye almost whispers when she sees a glint in Jemma’s eyes. It’s almost the way she would look at her again, but while talking about someone else. Her heart stammers in her chest and she clenches her jaws together. “Excuse me.”

Skye gets up to go to the bathroom and once the door is closed behind her, she rests her hands on the edges of the sink heavily. The tiles are spinning. Her head pounds. Jemma still has feelings for him. And she’s married to her.

Jemma and Adam used to date, Skye knows that. Jemma told her all about him. He cheated on her, but she probably forgot that part, since she figured it out a little before she met Skye. It’s not that Skye dislikes Adam, it’s just that she wants to feed his guts to wolves.

She feels sick all of a sudden and sits down next to the toilet, resting her back against the wall next to it.

“Skye, are you okay?” Jemma calls out, but Skye doesn’t know what to answer. She sits there for another minute, her head resting in her hands, tears dripping between her knees.

“I don’t think I am…” she manages to produce after a while.

“Can I come in?”

She asks again when Skye doesn’t answer. She sighs. “Yeah, sure. Why not.”

The door slides open and Jemma crouches down next to her. The air is thick, heavy. Nothing feels the same. The hand Jemma rests on her forearm feels unfamiliar. Skye wants to dissolve right there and then. It’s too much. She misses Jemma too much. She’s sitting right there in front of her, everything she ever fell in love with, but nothing like the woman she married.

“I think we should talk,” Jemma whispers and Skye nods, twisting her wedding band around her finger.

“Probably.”

“Skye, I am trying, but I don’t know how to be your wife,” she whispers, resting her chin on her knees, shooting her a sideways glance. “I… I realised today that in this state of mind I have feelings for Adam and I’m so sorry that that’s hurting you, because I also feel somewhere deep inside that there’s this thing for you, but I don’t feel it right now.”

“It’s okay.”

“It’s not. I wish I could love you the way you love me, but…”

“But you can’t. I think you’d figure it out though. You figured it out once before.” A weak smile tugs on the corners of Skye’s lips and she sniffs, suppressing a sob.

“Skye…”

“I know… What do you want to do? I can’t keep you here if you don’t want to be here. You obviously don’t feel at home here…”

“I think we need to get a divorce… and that I need to go live with my parents, with my old friends… to figure everything out.”

Skye nods. A moment of impact. One that shatters her heart. She closes her eyes and bites down on her trembling bottom lip. Her throat hurts from, her chest feels heavy. “Okay… I’ll try. Just…”

“Just what?”

“Never mind…”

* * *

_“You’re insane. We’re not going to do this again. It’s November and you want to swim in a lake. That’s just insane, Skye!”_

_A laugh bubbles from Skye’s throat and she rolls her eyes. “C’mon Jem! Live a little.”_

_Jemma scrunches her nose when Skye unbuttons her blouse and throws it onto the backseat of their car, her tank top quickly following suit._

_“I am in love with an idiot.”_

_Skye just grins while taking off her watch and ring, putting them on the dashboard._

_This is the only time Skye takes off her wedding band. Once a year on the last day of what they call their ‘first date anniversary’. One week a year to celebrate that they still lived for the moments of impact, while everything else faded into oblivion. Jemma calls her insane every year._

_“Are you gonna undress, or do you need my help?” Skye chuckles and Jemma swats at her bare arm._

_“Shut up.”_

_“Ow! Meanie!”_

_Skye unbuckles her belt, her fingers already going numb while she shimmies out of her pants. It’s cold outside. Sometimes they had unfortunate weather. Snow would lace the streets. One year they had to pass because the lake had frozen over. This was a year with unfortunate weather, snow falling down, but not sticking to the streets yet._

_“But love, honestly. It’s so cold,” Jemma pouts while shrugging off her cardigan and throwing it to Skye._

_“I’ll keep you warm. But come on, Jemma Simmons. You’re letting me freeze to death out here. I know you want to do this, you just mock me every year. Just replay our first date. I know I am a moron, but you fell in love with this moron.” Skye grins when her bare feet hit the ground. She jumps up and down, and pounces Jemma the second she’s undressed._

_“Because it’s insane! It was insane on our first date. It was insane on our first year anniversary and it’s still insane!” The tail of her sentence drowns in a squeal when Skye picks her up and rushes them into the water._

_It’s one of those moments of impact. Crashing them together. The lake swallows them whole, but Skye’s hands never leave her hips. Once they resurface, Skye’s lips have turned a dark shade of blue and Jemma’s jaws clatter._

_“Oh god! So cold!” Jemma’s laugh echoes over the water and she takes Skye’s hand, dragging her out of the lake. Her trembling hands find Skye’s wet cheeks and she presses a numb kiss to her lips._

_Skye smiles and reaches into the truck to grab them a towel and a blanket. Quickly she rubs it over Jemma’s body to get her warm again and wraps her in one of her oversized sweaters._

_“Please put something on, you’re going to catch a cold.” Jemma shivers and throws a towel around Skye’s shoulders, squeezing them._

_“I’m fine,” she grins and puts on a pair of sweats, “get in, honey.”_

_She climbs behind the wheel and fires up the engine, blasting the heat up full while Jemma gets into the passenger seat. She holds out her hands to Skye and grins so wide that it almost doesn’t fit on her face._

_“I can’t feel my fingers.”_

_Skye takes them, kissing each fingers and blowing on them, carefully warming them in her own hands._

_When they get home, the heating system is already on, so the house is comfortable._ Their _house. Jemma decorated it, mostly. Skye just threw in some of her stuff here and there. But it was perfect. The combination of messiness and tidiness. The perfect blend of the both of them._

_“Do you want to replay everything we did on our first date?” Skye whispers when they stand in the very dark kitchen. Neither of them bothers to turn on the lights and Jemma giggles when Skye’s hands slip around her waist, drawing her back to Skye’s front._

_“It was one of the best nights I ever had,” Jemma answers truthfully and turns around, wrapping her arms around Skye’s neck, brushing their noses together. She first presses a soft kiss to Skye’s top, then bottom lip. She nips gently and Skye’s breath hitches._

_“When I met you, you never pegged me as the sex on the first date kind of girl, though, Jem,” Skye mumbles with her lips against the column of Jemma’s throat. She laughs._

_“Why not? I am not a goodie… oh…” Her sentence is swallowed by Skye, who kisses her hungrily and guides her back to the bedroom that’s adjacent to their living, only a book case separating the two._

_“I know you’re not a goodie two shoes,” Skye laughs quietly and slips her hands under the sweater Jemma is wearing._

_“Well, you and your bad girl shenanigans tell me pretty much the same, Skye, really. You’re hardly any better than me.”_

_Skye laughs and presses a few kisses to Jemma’s lips.  “I love you.”_

_That has Jemma’s heart swelling and she sighs contently, slipping her arms around Skye and kissing her again. She’d never get tired of that. She’s one hundred percent sure. There are little things she’d never get tired off. Science, and Skye._

_“I sometimes think I’m going to implode with all these feelings I have for you, Skye. I really love you so much. It’s insane how much there can be in one person.”_

_It wasn’t the first ‘I love you’ they exchanged. Not the last, either, Skye is sure. But some I love yous are more meaningful than others. After five years this I love you still means as much to her as their first._

_Skye trails her lips down Jemma’s neck and between her breasts, kissing her in all the right places until her name is the last thing on Jemma’s lips._

* * *

Moving on is the hardest part, Skye realises. Jemma has nothing to move on from. She still has her work at the Academy. She still has a love, a different love. Not a once in a lifetime love. Skye knows that if only something changed about her condition she would fall in love with Skye all over again, but after eight months it doesn’t look like that.

The divorce papers had been signed months ago, but still moving on was the hardest part. She had to leave everything behind, even though she kept the house, she kept the car, she kept the cat. She kept everything, but lost everything. Nothing really mattered.

It’s not that Skye doesn’t function without Jemma around, but her life feels a whole lot emptier without her there. Mornings don’t feel the same, evenings are quiet… her bed is empty. Most of the times. She tries to sleep with other people to fill the hole in her heart, but it doesn’t work.

She’s been thinking about engaging herself to the girl sleeping next to her, but she feels like she can’t do that if Jemma is still on her mind. She has to let go. She has to let go. She has to let go.

But how do you look at the woman you love and tell yourself that it’s time to walk away. Point is, you just do. Because at the end of the day all Skye wants is Jemma to be happy. And Jemma was, even if Skye isn’t. Not entirely. Sam was nice, pretty, intelligent and creative. She cooked a mean risotto and she made Skye laugh.

That would have been enough.

It would have been enough.

Wasn’t it for the moment of impact called Jemma Simmons.

Sam stirs next to her and rolls over, draping her heavy arm over Skye’s bare abdomen. She sighs. Sam smells nice, but Skye can’t help comparing everything Sam does to Jemma. She would never know, though… she wouldn’t break Sam’s heart like that. Even though Skye told Sam about what happened with Jemma, she wouldn’t tell her stuff like that. Sam loves her, but she also realises that she would leave in a heartbeat if she ever finds what she and Jemma ever had.

It was the easiest choice to make. It was a moment of impact. One that throws your life upside down, and suddenly nothing else matters. Everything matters.

And there’s nothing Skye can do, because she’s probably in a relationship with Adam, and she is pretty much in a relationship with Sam. And she’s happy. Sort of, when she doesn’t have to think about Jemma too much, when she doesn’t find an old thing that reminds her of what once was.

“You’re breaking your head again,” Sam mumbles into her shoulder and Skye smiles.

“I am. Sorry.”

“We can talk about it in the morning. Is it work?”

Skye wavers for a second, blinking hard. “Yeah, it is. Stupid assignment.”

“Come back to sleep.”

* * *

 _“You don’t even_ like _museums, Skye. Why do you insist we go to one? I can go with someone else, it’s no big deal,” Jemma says when they get out of the car and reaches out for Skye’s hand._

_“No, but I like you. And you love museums. We went to this computer thing last week, we can go to an art show now. It’s fine, you always make art interesting.” Skye smiles and presses her lips to her temple before steering them inside._

_It was a typical art exposition where you dressed up for. That already made it worthwhile. Jemma is wearing a red gown with an open back and gorgeous heels. Her hair is up in a curly ‘ensemble’._

_“You look beautiful, by the way,” Jemma whispers when they walk inside and grabs two flutes of champagne of a tray. Skye laughs softly and shakes her head._

_“You said that.”_

_“I meant it.”_

_“Thank you. You look beautiful, too.” Skye smiles. She’s wearing a navy blue dress herself with a slit that shows her left leg sometimes if she wants. Her heels are miraculously comfortable. She almost wore a tuxedo, but she knows that even though Jemma thinks she’s very attractive in a tux, she also loves it when Skye wears a dress. The things people do for love._

_Jemma reaches out for her but Skye steps away, raising her hands to avoid contact. Jemma shoots her a quizzical look before dropping her hands limply at her sides again. “Skye?”_

_“Read the sign.”_

_“Don’t touch the masterpieces… Skye! Oh my god, that is the worst pick up line you have used on me. And believe me there were plenty. I was there to witness it.”_

_She has to laugh though and swats at Skye’s arm before linking their fingers together anyway. “You’re insufferable.”_

_“I know. But you married me, so you’re stuck with this one.”_

_“I wouldn’t trade you for the world,” Jemma says and scrunches her nose._

_Skye can spend hours in an art gallery with Jemma, if she had to. Sure, it might not have been her first place of choice, but Jemma could talk about art for hours, telling her stories that the little cards on the wall couldn’t even begin to compare to. She would tell her about how a painting reminded her of a holiday in France, or how a sculpture reminded her of the Archaeology Museum in Athens, or how her mother would take her to a workshop back in England, because ‘having a creative outlet is important, Jemma’. Skye just loves hearing it all. It’s almost as if she is right there with her._

* * *

Skye’s phone rings and shakes her from her nap on the couch. The cat jumps from her lap and meows as if it’s offended and Skye glares at her. Two times she sighs before picking up the phone.

“Hello?”

“Yes, hi. I’m looking for Skye?”

“You’ve found her?”

“Great. Okay this is going to sound terrible. You don’t know me, or probably don’t remember me, but you were married to Jemma Simmons, correct?”

“Yes, for five years. Who are you?”

“Adam White. We met once, probably at your wedding.”

“Adam. You’re Jemma’s new boyfriend, or old boyfriend, or college boyfriend. Anyway, why are you calling me? Why do you think that I’d want to talk to you after everything that happened?”

Skye clenches her jaws together when she finally recognizes his voice and nearly hangs up. But then Adam says something that changes her mind.

“Jemma has had… a little accident. She will only speak to you.”

“Where are you?”

Adam gives her the address of their current home and before he is entirely finished it’s loaded into her navigation and is she in the car.

Blood rushes in her ears. Another accident. She’s not in the hospital, so it probably isn’t anything too bad. What if she broke something? Why did she only want to talk to Skye?

It’s a twenty minute drive from their old home to the apartment Jemma lived in now. She probably moved in with Adam a few months the crash and Skye swallows hard. It looks nothing like the house they shared. It resembled nothing like the home they built together. It makes her feel sick to her stomach.

Her phone rings again. Sam. She ignores it.

Before she can even knock on the door, it opens and Adam stands in the doorway.

“Hi, thanks for coming. I… I didn’t know what else to do. She hit her head, and now she wouldn’t talk to anyone but you.”

“Shut up. Where is she?”

“In the kitchen.”

“Don’t follow me.”

She pushes past him, barely even looking him in the eye.

“Jem?” Skye calls out and she hears someone setting down a cup on a wooden table. It’s the last door in the hallway and Skye pushes the door open.

Jemma is sitting at the kitchen table, an icepack to her forehead. The cut isn’t too deep, Skye can see that from here. It already stopped bleeding.

“Hi, love. What happened?” Skye asks quietly while sitting down next to her and placing her hand over Jemma’s.

“I slipped on the stairs…”

“Are you alright?”

“Skye… I…” White hot panic is written all over her face. Skye can practically see the artery pulsing in her neck. Jemma swallows hard and puts the ice pack down before rubbing her eye. “I’m fine. It’s good to see you…”

“It’s good to see you, too. I’m sorry I didn’t call it was too painful to see you with Adam. We both needed to move on, so I did. Why did you want to see me?”

“You moved on..?”

“I had no choice. You divorced me, Jemma… for a college guy. I was stuck with Bruce… I lost the love of my life the day we got into that car crash and I tried to fix it, to fix us, but when your memory wouldn’t come back… I’m sorry I gave up, but the best option last year seemed moving on…”

“I hit my head…”

“Yes, Adam said that.”

“I remember everything,” Jemma whispers, looking down at their hands. Jemma turns her hand palm up to hold Skye’s properly. She swallows thickly, looking Jemma straight in the eyes.

“You remember everything? Jemma there is a naked girlfriend in my bed right now, and you are  _living_ with a man. It’s been eight months. And you fall down the stairs, hit your head and  _now_  remember everything?” Skye’s voice breaks at the end, tears threatening to spill. Her throat feels thick, hear heart thumps in her throat.

“I’m sorry, Skye… I am…”

“I’m sorry, too. I need some time. I’m not sure if I can do this now…”

“Skye, we said vows. We vowed in sickness and in health, and to agree to disagree on red velvet cake and you vowed that we would always, no matter what, find our way back to each other.”

“Yes! We said our vows!” Skye shouts and pulls back her hands, throwing them up in exasperation. “And you left me!”

Jemma nods and folds her hands in her lap, biting the inside of her cheek. She pushes a strand of her hair behind her ear and sighs. She looks up at Skye again, who just looks at her in shock, in anger, in despair.

“Do you still love me?” Jemma asks quietly and sucks in a deep breath. On the one hand she’s afraid of the answer. What if it’s no. What if it turns out that people didn’t love each other until infinity, until the end of time, until they had grown old together?

“Yes, Jemma. Yes, I do. I love you, I have never stopped loving you. I will always love you. Of course I love you, that’s just a stupid question, but that doesn’t mean that I am capable of just picking up the life we stopped living months ago. I don’t even know what to think right now.”

“Maybe we can figure it out again. You said it yourself. I figured it out once, I figured it out again. Skye, please. I love you.”

Skye swallows hard and rolls her eyes back to blink the tears out of her eyes. She shakes her head.

“I just don’t know what to do,” she whispers. “What about Adam, and Sam? We have been living different lives for the past eight months.”

“I’m not asking you to marry me again.”

“I asked you the first time,” Skye counters and laughs lightly. Jemma rolls her eyes.

“I know. Go out on a date with me Skye, say this Friday? We could go for breakfast, maybe? I have a usual, you know,” Jemma smiles.

It’s  _the_  smile.  _Her_ smile. Skye’s insides turn to mush again, and it’s as if she’s falling in love with her all over again. It’s the soft dimple in her cheek, the light sparkle in her eyes; like she put the stars in the sky. Her heart skips a beat and all Skye wants to do is wrap Jemma up in her arms and hold her. So she does. She scoops Jemma in her arms while standing up, their bodies pressed flush together. Jemma’s breath hitches, but she tangles her fingers into Skye’s hair at her neck and breathes in her scent.   
  
“Skye…” Jemma whispers, pulling back gently. She swallows hard and searches her face.

“I know,” she answers, leaning down. Their lips brush together and an electric shock runs from the crown of her head to the bottom of her feet. “I know.”

A moment of impact.


End file.
